


Five Miles Outside Catanzaro, Calabria

by redscudery



Series: Scudery's Saturday Night Fic Fest [28]
Category: Call Me By Your Name (2017), Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Italy, John is a Bit Not Good, M/M, Sherlock is a Brat, Vignette, Virgin Sherlock, Wet Clothing, alfresco sex, meddling landladies, perfect kismet, the good kind
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-23
Updated: 2018-04-23
Packaged: 2019-04-26 15:21:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14404911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redscudery/pseuds/redscudery
Summary: "My whole life I've tried to do it right... so fuck every single rule. I am going to bend slender farm boys over split-rail fences, goddammit, and I'm going to use olive oil as lube." –John Watson, probably.A disillusioned John goes to Italy to recuperate. He finds what he needs.Based on this gifset and largely merindab's fault: http://redscudery.tumblr.com/post/173190009225/rominatrix-martin-freeman-and-his-call-me-by-your





	Five Miles Outside Catanzaro, Calabria

**Author's Note:**

> I didn't intend to write this. I swear I'm working on my Backwoods AU. But it just happened. 
> 
> Thanks to everyone who enabled me on Twitter and CWB for making sure Sherlock had the correct Italian name.

John Watson, discharged from the army, disillusioned by the idea of nation, is no longer able to stand the sight of England. He buys a ticket to Italy—Calabria—on a whim. He barely has time to pack; he forgets socks, jeans, all but two shirts, some pants, and a cream linen suit Harry made him buy for her wedding. He doesn't shave. He buys a scarf and some sunglasses at the airport.

He finds a cheap pension somewhere in the south, on a farm. He sits, morosely, in his linen suit, with his bare ankles, growing a beard. His landlady thinks he's very elegant. He thinks he's a bum.

The farm boys ignore him, for the most part. Until William Sherlock Scott Holmes ("Guglielmo", he says tersely to the landlady) comes to the farm, shipped off by Mycroft who has had enough of him moping around.

"Guglielmo" decides he's going to blend so entirely into his surroundings that he'll eventually be able to disappear. (Give Guglielmo a break, he's 18 and hitting a late-puberty angst high.) He sets out to work. He keeps his mouth shut, for the most part.

So right away Guglielmo stands out because he's pale as a lily and thin; John starts watching him. Not out of prurient interest, at first, but because he's so different. But then his hair lengthens, his skin becomes golden, and the muscles on his back and legs get more and more defined.

As summer wanes, the olives fruit on the tree. John has a handful of pages of a terrible memoir and a raging crush on Guglielmo. Guglielmo is not immune. He notices the bearded, angry man in the shade by the farmhouse. One day he spills water on his bare ankles. On purpose.

John is angry. Guglielmo can see it in his face. He opens his mouth to deduce John, to make him angrier. He stops, though. Can't say why. But his cheeks are hot. John is charmed by this submission.

He says something to Guglielmo that's kind--tersely kind, but kind--and Guglielmo can barely look at him. Probably because he's got an extremely awkward boner under those worn and stained work jeans. John goes back to his room and writes a poem about slim, clean-limbed boys.

The next day, John is marginally more cheerful and Guglielmo is wearing different jeans. John inquires about Guglielmo's age. Guglielmo does extra work, all in sight of the farmhouse. The landlady watches. She sees Guglielmo strip his shirt off in the full sun. She sees John lick his lips and swallow down the last of a glass of limoncello and meditatively tongue an ice cube.

She tells John that Guglielmo is 18.

John goes back to his room for a long siesta. He feels like a very bad man when he gets off fantasizing about Guglielmo washing at the stream with the other farmhands. He knows he’s a very bad man when he thinks of creeping down to watch. 

Guglielmo, by absolutely no lucky chance at all, is pruning a convenient tree near John's window while John is doing this. He comes in his pants, then starts laying plans. His virginity has never troubled him before but right now it seems like the heaviest burden in the world.

The next day, the landlady rushes up to John and begs him to take the car to a remote nearby town to fetch a tractor part. She is so sorry, what an imposition, but she will pack him a beautiful lunch. There is a scenic waterfall on the way home, so lovely.

John gets to the car and Guglielmo is there, waiting. He looks sulky. The car is very old, says the landlady, Guglielmo, he can fix anything. He can rest while you picnic. John nods. He tosses his scarf around his neck and puts his sunglasses on. Guglielmo moderates his breathing and gets into the back seat.

John, with a wolfish grin he feels is somewhat put-on, nonetheless invites Guglielmo up front. Guglielmo is already fighting an awkward boner, so he lets loose a vicious deduction. John laughs and is now also fighting an awkward boner. Guglielmo swings his long legs over into the front seat as they pull out of the farm lane.

The car ride is long. They bond--John loves Guglielmo's cleverness, Guglielmo is fascinated by John. They share the picnic, dusty from the car ride. The waterfall is as beautiful as advertised. Guglielmo doesn’t stay in the car.

John enjoys watching him eat much more than he’s ever enjoyed any meal. Guglielmo has never tasted baked eggplant so good. He dips bread in the rich oil and licks his lips.

They swim, bare limbs shining in the sun. They are both wearing white drawers and those drawers are thinner than they expected and they come together like magnets in the summer dusk. They make out. There is beard burn along Guglielmo’s neck and thighs. John’s jaw aches from rimming him.

They spend the next five weeks—the rest of the summer—fucking in every conceivable place and position, including but not limited to mutual blowjobs in the hayloft; in a field of sweet clover late at night; in John’s room at siesta time; in Guglielmo’s dormitory bed during the day when they should be working; among the olive trees.

John tastes every inch of Guglielmo's skin. Holds him down. Makes him take everything.

Guglielmo gives himself up with joyous relief. He pushes back to feel John take him down.

John writes 200 pages of an erotic novel. Guglielmo reads it and points out inaccuracies. The book never gets finished; there’s always one more kiss that must be given, now, right now.

 

Then, summer slows. John carries that first poem everywhere. Olive oil gets made. Hogs are slaughtered.

“Guglielmo” is summoned back, for school. John’s money is running out.

They say goodbye and neither one of them cries. Guglielmo flies back to England with a circle of teeth marks on his neck and tears in his eyes.

John doesn’t know how he lived. He’s more lonely than he ever was. He sits in his bedsit and fondles his gun.

Then, on one more cold day,  he meets Mike Stamford on a park bench.

Mike takes him to meet Sherlock Holmes in a morgue. It’s not cold any more; the sun is shining.

The riding crop is put to good use. They won’t be needing two bedrooms.

Mycroft takes the cameras out of 221b. Mrs. Hudson writes newsy letters to the Calabrian landlady.

John and Sherlock never go back to Italy. Somehow they don’t need to.


End file.
